3 Answers
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The MIME type is a description of the data returned by a request on the Internet (originally used by e-mail, and later used by many parts of the web).

Since data can take hundreds (if not thousands) of forms, both textual and binary, it helps a program to know what type of data it is dealing with, rather than trying to write code that figures it out automatically.

The program can use this data to either select a handler (jpg vs. png), or simply refuse to handle data that isn't a type it knows how to handle, or doesn't want to deal with (e.g. an mp3, where it is expecting xml).

This can also be used to classify data (search engines), or restrict it (in a web proxy or e-mail server).

So it means that all browser that renders any page have to look into this MIME type right? So is that there is any parser or interpreter in browser to find what type it has been used? So that it can render correctly?
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Ant'sMar 19 '11 at 5:30

An Internet media type, originally called a MIME type after MIME (Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) and sometimes a Content-type after the name of a header in several protocols whose value is such a type, is a two-part identifier for file formats on the Internet.